Asura
by cupid-painted-blind
Summary: Azula, after Sozin's comet passes, is desperately alone. / Part eight: Azula has a bad day, and a knife.
1. only

_asura--_

It was a long time before her screams died out and the fire stopped. By then, the comet had passed and the sky returned to the dusky blue of early sunset and all the people who had been at the palace had filled the streets to cheer or cry or rant. Here, where she was, silence reigned.

She tugged, again, at the chains around her wrists, trying to slip them off or loosen them somehow, but the skin on her hands was raw from ice and flame, and the constant shifting left her bleeding and in agony. It wasn't really worth it. Someone would be by to free her soon enough. She lifted her head, listening for footsteps.

"No one is coming," a voice whispered in her ear. She shook her head resolutely.

"They'll come. They'll come for me."

"No, they won't. It's just you and me here, Azula."

"No," she hissed, "you aren't real. You aren't here. You're just a figment of my imagination. Soon, Ty Lee or Mai... Or Li and Lo or, or _someone_, someone will come for me."

"Ty Lee and Mai are locked up tight in prison, remember?" Her mother knelt beside her, brushing ghostly fingers through her hair. "And Li and Lo won't come out this far to find you. You've been left here."

"You aren't real," she repeated, a mantra, trying to force her mind into clarity. She wracked her brain, tried to put the pieces together and figure out what to do next. "Father, he'll come for me."

"If this is any indication of how today has gone, your father is already dead. And even if he isn't, you think he will come for you? You _failed_. I'm the only one who will stay with you now."

The chains behind her chinked softly. She leaned forward heavily. "He'll come. They'll come. Zuko -- Zuko won't leave me here. He'll have to come and get me soon enough. He'll free me. I'm his sister! He won't just -- he won't -- he'll come for me."

"Why would he do something like that?" Her mother's voice shifted to something softer, crueler. The figure shimmered and disappeared, and on her other side, a creature slithered out of the depths and wrapped itself around her shoulders, leaning close into her ear, voice barely above a whisper. "You would have left him for dead. Why would he save you?"

The demon of self-loathing. Her oldest, and truest, friend.

"You aren't real," she whispered, choking on her own voice.

"Of course not," it hissed, skeletal fingers raking across her neck, "but I'm all you have."

"No," she replied, hating the way her voice cracked.

"Yes," it confirmed, a kind of sick joy bleeding into its voice. "You've got nothing left. But don't worry, darling," it morphed back into her mother, an arm wrapped comfortably around her. "I'll always be here for you. I'll never abandon you, or betray you, like those stupid girls did. I'll never lie to you, or tie you up and leave you for dead. I'll never turn you away. You and me, Azula dear, it's just you and me."

"You aren't real," she repeated, finally crying, something inside her chest falling through her soul, shattering to the ground like glass. Her voice rose in hysteria, "You aren't real, you aren't real, _you aren't real!_"

Her mother kissed her on the forehead, transforming back into the serpentine, demonic form she wasn't used to. "But I'm here for you, sweetheart. I'm the only one who is."

"No," she insisted. She looked up, and met its eyes, sharp golden, Fire Nation eyes, set in a burned-black face that might have been her own, in some other dimension. It smiled.

"It'll all be okay, Azula. I won't leave you."

She stared blankly into her own eyes. Her oldest friend, her darkest enemy, her coldest demon. "Yes," she whispered. It nodded, the smile growing. "Yes," she repeated, head bowing. "It's just you and me."

* * *

A/N: Changed the title from "Only" -- a reference to the Nine Inch Nails song -- to "Asura," the Hindu term for "demon" and a reference to Azula's name.


	2. nightmare

_nightmare --_

It happens every time she sleeps. It starts as whispers, disembodied voices hissing at her, horrible words and sickening descriptions -- and then the visions start. Creatures writhing toward her, made of shadows and hate, baring yellow teeth and wearing a bastardized version of her face, like if she'd been burnt at the stake and sliced into pieces. Blood on their lips, dripping down their faces, into their grins and staining their teeth a dirty red -- they all reach out for her. She tries to escape, but can't, her hands chained down behind her back, holding her in place while they come closer, long fingernails digging into her skin and pulling away the surface layers, tongues in her ear -- _it's just you and me, Azula._

She wakes with a start and rolls over, groaning. Another sleepless night. She's used to it by now, but it's still aggravating, and her emotions are starting to fray with the insomnia. She isn't in control so much anymore, and she wants -- no, _needs_ -- to have that control back.

It slips out of her fingers, though. She throws open the doors to the balcony and stands in the wind and the harsh moonlight. She hates the moon.

Trying to calm herself, she closes her eyes and counts to ten. Soon, the comet will come and the world will be theirs. Soon, all of this will be a nasty memory and she will be Fire Lord and the entire world will bow at her feet. Hell, maybe even _Father_ will learn to bow at her feet, given a little time. She licks her lips and leans on the railing.

"You can't escape that easy, you know," a too-familiar voice whispers. She turns sharply, in time to see the figure melting from the shadows. For an instant, it's the monster of her nightmares, and then it morphs into another figure.

"_Mother?_" she gasps, and then catches herself. "No. No, you're just -- you're not real."

"You can wake up," her mother says softly, laying a hand on her shoulder, "but the nightmares will simply follow you."

Resolutely, she turns back to the moon, and tries to block out the feeling of a phantom hand on her shoulder. Firebending moves, that will clear her mind and make this nasty hallucination disappear. She walks herself through the movements, holding back her fire -- best not to draw too much attention to herself -- turning the martial art into a kind of dance. Breifly, she remembers being very young and begging to be taught ballet. But Father said that it wasn't befitting of his daughter.

Just another reason to hate Ty Lee.

"I won't go away, Azula," her mother hisses in her ear. She leaps up onto the railing and throws herself harder into her firebending. If it's a hallucination, that means that it's just a figment of her imagination, which means that she has control over it. She can make it disappear if she wills it hard enough. She closes her eyes tight and imagines that she is alone on the balcony. "I'm still here," the voice reminds her. "I'll always be here."

"_No_," she replies, biting on her tongue so hard she tastes blood. Against her will, fire bursts from her fingertips. She is slipping.

Her form is more chaotic, insomnia and frustration making her wilder, tearing more and more control from her mind. She can barely control the fire raging in her chest, let alone the fire she bends. Without sleep or anyone to trust, she's coming apart at the seams -- she can feel it happening, but she's powerless to stop it; the helplessness only makes her angrier.

"You'll slip if you keep that up, sweetheart. Why don't you try to get some more sleep? It's still several hours till dawn."

"You didn't care this much when you were alive," she spits, "so why care now?"

"Azula, darling, of course I cared about you when I was here."

"_Liar!_" she screams, and stumbles, crashing back down to the balcony. Her mother kneels, and places a hand under her chin, leaning in closely, to whisper in her ear.

"_I'm who you always wanted me to be,_" she says, "_I'm the part of you that loved her, that loved Mai and Ty Lee, that loved Zuko and your father and even Li and Lo. I'm all the good in you."_

"And I want you _gone," _she responds brokenly. "I don't want to ever see you again."

"Not true," her mother says, standing up. "You don't want to look me in the eye. You can't face me. The same reason you smashed your mirrors."

"You always thought I was a monster," she sneers, looking up, "now I've proven you right."

"On the contrary, I never thought you were a monster. I loved you."

"Princess Azula!" a muffled voice calls from the other side of the bedroom. "Princess Azula, I heard screaming and crashing. Is everything all right?"

_No, nothing is right, everything is wrong_. "Of course I'm fine," she barks, irritated at the interruption. "I just -- I just had a nightmare and fell out of bed. Now shut up and leave me be."

Hesitation. And then, "Of course, Princess Azula."

"You lie too well," her mother says, now mysteriously behind her. "They can't hear the truth underneath it. That's what you want, isn't it? You want them to see through you."

"No," she replies, "I want them to leave me alone."

"You're lying again. You forget, I'm all in your head, Azula. You can't lie to me."

She bows her head. "I'm not lying," she hisses through her teeth. "I just want to be left alone."

"No, you don't. You want them to _care_ enough that they _don't_ leave you alone."

She stands up, her knees aching from where she landed on them, and walks back into her room, stone-faced. Her mother is sitting on her bed. Instead of reacting, she simply turns and closes the balcony doors quietly and calmly, locking them and fastidiously pulling the curtains over them to cover the windows. She takes a deep breath before turning back around. Her mother is smiling, patting the bed beside her.

Her teeth are dirty red, stained with blood, leaking out of her mouth and on her lips.

She draws in a shaky breath and lays down to try and sleep.

* * *

A/N: I'm running with the idea that Azula is severely bipolar, even though she several years too young to really be showing symptoms (it doesn't tend to develop until you're an adult, and often not until you're in your thirties), but it's really the best way to explain her behavior. She's in the middle of what appears to be a nasty manic swing toward the end of series, though at this point I wrote her in a more mixed state, with symptoms of both a manic and a depressive state. Symptoms of severe mania can include hallucinations and delusions, and I've thrown in insomnia, which only compounds the problem. Because she's bipolar, she'll have times of utter clarity and others of complete delusion and some of absolute suicidal depression. Also, yes, this is catharsis for me, which is why it'll probably update erratically and with little regard to the timeline of the series.


	3. roses of may

_roses of may_  
(this part of me I choose not to see.)

* * *

The taste of regret is unfamiliar, and bitter on her tongue.

She is alone. Utterly, horrifyingly, desperately alone.

The cell they've placed her in is supposed to be comforting -- it's painted a soothing mint green, the bed is comfortable and warm, there's a window with cheery curtains and a spectacular view of the sea -- all to make her less angry, less likely to snap and kill all of them. The medications they feed her help, crushed herbs mixed into a pale tea or fed to her in a syrup. The syrup is the worst; thick and tasting like dirt and ash, and the effects settle on her heavily, an unnatural low euphoria causing her to lay on her bed and drool like an invalid, all emotion suffocated under the blanket of the drug.

But the worst part is -- the worst part is, she's starting to crave that. Because, weak as she is when they give her that drug, the pain eases then. She doesn't hate, she doesn't feel this bizarre regret, and everything about the world -- the world that has chewed her up and spat her out -- dissolves into nothing.

She has not seen her mother in sixteen days. The pale tea, they tell her, contains a powerful mood stabilizer, a strong anti-depressant, an anti-psychotic designed to take away the hallucinations and the worst of the mood swings. She's noticed a correlation -- the more of that tea they give her, the less of the syrup. The syrup is for bad days, the nurse insists, for days when the tea isn't enough to silence her demons. The nurse doesn't understand, she thinks, when she's alone in the stony emptiness of her room, that silencing her demons can't make them leave her.

When she's lucid, when the tea is working and sanity descends upon her, she tastes regret.

She does not want to taste regret.

After she screams at them to just give her the fucking syrup, just make all the madness and regret and horror _stop please just make it stop, _they send in a very kind, very fat woman with a voice like poisoned honey who tells her that _everything is getting better, it's all okay._

And she wants to lash out like she might have once, to tear the woman's fat face right off her skull and light it on fire, to make her understand how very _not okay_ everything is, how she needs that syrup and how she's afraid of sanity, afraid of being okay, afraid of both never seeing her mother's image again and of having the hallucinations return. Instead, she swallows her boiling rage and asks politely what the _fuck_ makes her think that things are getting better?

"The hallucinations are gone, Dearie, right? You haven't reported seeing or hearing anything lately, have you? Your moods are much stabler, and with a combination of therapy and medication, I think that you may soon be able to return to society! Isn't that wonderful?"

No, she wants to say, no, that's the _opposite_ of wonderful. That's terrible. How can she survive in that society anymore? She is not the Fire Lord Azula anymore, no, she's a weak, pathetic child who begs for a disgusting syrup to take away reality and who owes what lucidity she has to a bitter tea. This is not the Azula that her father raised.

That girl died on the day of Sozin's comet; she is merely a ghost, a construct, a puppetmaster tugging at the strings of a corpse. And they call this wonderful?

She stops drinking the tea. Better the madness, better the opiate narcosis, better anything than -- than --

"This is a bad idea, Azula," her mother whispers in her ear. She curls into the fetal position on the bed, clutching a pillow to her chest, and answers in a tiny, disgustingly weak voice.

"You left me. And you said you wouldn't leave me. You _promised._"

Her mother pets her head softly, and she closes her eyes, reveling in the imaginary feeling, trying to convince herself that it is real, that she is not alone, that someone in the world loves her.

"I know, my baby," her mother says, caressing her cheek, "I'm sorry. I never meant to go."

And the worst part is -- the worst part is she chose this fate. She _chose_ to forgo medication. _Sanity is lonely_, she tells the therapist when pressed to give a reason why, _and this way I'm never alone_. The look on the therapist's face is one of deep sorrow, and she leans forward the way her false mother does, and cups her cheek in her hand.

"Oh, Azula. You're not alone."

She meets the other woman's eyes, skeptical and cynical and so, so angry. The voice in her ear, the voice of one of her many demons, whispers to her to kill that horrible, stupid woman who -- right now, right as she speaks -- is planning _to take them all away_. To take her mother away again, to leave her locked up in that mint green room with the cheery window and the far-off crashing of the sea against the shore, to make her _forget _the Fire Lord Azula.

The therapist must see something of her fury reflected in her eyes, because she immediately calls to the nurses and speaks with them in hushed tones. She catches bits and pieces of the conversation, enough to know that they're going to start force-feeding her the tea, and she tastes -- once again -- the bitterness of regret.

"You shouldn't have told them," her mother says, "they're going to make me leave you."

Without the heavy blankness of the syrup or the tingly clarity of the tea, snatches of the old Azula return. She imagines it, envisions it clearly -- snap the fire-resistant cloth holding her to the chair, kick the chair at the therapist. While she's distracted, use long-suppressed and medicated-into-submission firebending to blast the nurse through the door. Rush the nurse before she has a chance to respond, silencing her with a quick jab to the throat, and shut the door behind her, wedging something in it to keep the therapist from escaping. Kill or subdue the nurse with a knock to the back of the head or a twist of the neck. Take her keys and make for the dining area, where they'll surely have a loading dock with fewer guards. Kill or subdue anyone who stands between her and freedom. Find a place to hide in the outside world. Re-learn firebending.

Re-take her throne.

"You need to take the medication, Azula. It's for your own good." The therapist is standing in front of her, holding out the cup of pale tea. "Drink the tea," she says, softer, "and I'll make sure you're never alone." She takes Azula's hands and wraps them around the teacup, and then wraps her own around Azula's. "I want to help you, but you have to let me."

_Don't drink the tea_, her mother hisses.

_I'll make sure you're never alone._

Against every screaming instinct and everything she has ever believed in, she drinks the tea. The therapist smiles encouragingly.

Azula feels sick.

* * *

A/N: A reviewer mentioned in the last chapter that Azula's hallucinations were always true-to-life -- which is true -- but I'm taking things in a slightly different direction. For one, her hallucinations are all images called up from her own mind, so they can't lie to her. But more than that, I'm intensifying what was already going on in-series with Azula (because as she ages and matures, the mental disorder would intensify) so she's not just hallucinating her mother, but a whole host of other creatures, scapegoats, if you will, that she can blame all of her failures and mistakes on. Like I said in the last chapter, I'm running with the concept that Azula is _severely _bipolar, and only getting worse as time passes.

Let me know what you think. If you think I've done something horribly wrong, please tell me so I can fix it. Au revoir!


	4. skin

_skin_  
(is this a dream, or is this my lesson?)

* * *

"Zuko?" she says softly, the name unfamiliar on her tongue. It feels foreign, like it's not really his name, like she's gotten it wrong, messed it up somehow. He sits down beside her at the fountain, and smiles -- really, genuinely _smiles_, like he's happy to see her.

"Hey, Azula."

"Zuko," she repeats, earnestly, and meets his eyes -- his even, symmetrical eyes, although the meaning is lost on her, "Zuko, I'm not a good person, am I?"

He laughs, and slings an arm around her shoulders. "La-la, you're my baby sister."

"What does that mean?"

"It means you're not a bad person," he assures her in a low whisper, like he's letting her in on a deep secret. She starts to cry.

"But I _am_," she cries, "I'm a _horrible _person! I've done horrible things to innocent people!"

"True," he says quietly, withdrawing his arm, "I guess you're not my baby sister. _My_ baby sister wouldn't do those kinds of things." _No!_ she wants to scream, _no, please!_ but the words don't come. His face suddenly twists and changes, and she's standing on a balcony with a cute older boy overlooking the Ember Island beach. Chen cocks an eyebrow appraisingly. "The most powerful couple in the Fire Nation, huh? You don't look like much."

"I'm the _princess_," she says petulantly, feeling like a child.

"Right. The princess," he replies skeptically. "Then tell me what you're doing _here_, Your Majesty."

And suddenly she's at the Boiling Rock prison and Mai is glaring at her, fire in her gaze. "You horrible _bitch_," she spits. "You unfeeling _whore._" She recoils as though physically struck, but Mai advances on her in an ugly rage, her fingernails turning to knives, which she uses to claw at her face. "You called me your _friend?_ You left me here to _die_, in a _prison!_ Do you know what they do to young girls in prisons, Azula?"

All the horrible images she can imagine appear before her -- Mai being flogged, Ty Lee being raped, both of them crying out in pain and hurt and despair.

"No," she says softly, shoving Mai's screeching body away from her, "No, you were my friend, but you -- you turned on me!"

"I only refused to let Zuko die! I did _nothing _to hurt you!"

"But you see what he did to me?" she cries, clutching at her hair, "You see? This is all his _fault!_ I could have -- I was supposed to be the _Fire Lord_ but look what he's done to me!"

Mai's usual mask of boredom and indifference clicks into place and she speaks with her slow monotone, "No, Azula, you did this to _yourself._"

A door shuts between her and Mai, and she leans against it heavily. There's a knock at it, and then someone tries the handle, but finds it locked. "Azula?" her mother says softly from the other side. "Azula, sweetie, I need to -- please let me in."

_No. No, you can't see me like this. You can't see me... broken._

A sigh, a sob. The light sound of someone leaning against the door. Her mother does not know that Azula is sitting against the other side of it. Very quietly, so quietly she can barely hear it -- "I'm so sorry, Azula." A long pause. "Goodbye."

She shrieks then, leaping to her feet and wrenching the door open. "_Mother!_" she cries, but Ursa is already gone.

An arm on her shoulder jerks her back to reality. She's laying in a soft, downy bed with a warm, cheerful yellow blanket which is now tangled up around her feet. The nurse rubs her back gently, "You were have a nightmare, sweet. You were screaming and crying. Here," she presses a warm cup into her hands, "drink."

"What's in this?" she replies hoarsely, tasting salty tears on her lips.

"Valerian root," the nurse tells her. "It'll help you sleep."

"I don't -- I can't -- " she stutters. How can she explain that, terrible though her nightmares may be, they're the best thing she has? She's unwilling to lose her dreams, unwilling to give up the sound of her mother's voice or the feeling of her brother's comforting hug. Even though they aren't real, they're so much better than reality, with the drugs and the stupid green room and the therapist and the nurses and the bitter loneliness.

"Drink," the nurse says soothingly, and Azula wishes, not for the first time, that that horrible waterbender had just killed her. Surely this slow torture is worse than death.

But _they _don't see it that way. They praise the Avatar's -- and the Fire Lord's -- mercy, in allowing Azula to live, and even giving her treatment for her obvious mental disease. She wants to scream, to curse, to _attack _those people who call this _mercy_, the ones who say she deserved much worse and that the Fire Lord must still love his little sister somehow.

Those _idiots._ The Fire Lord -- Zuko, he couldn't care less about her, locked up in a depressing room on a depressingly sheer cliff face with a whole crew of depressingly cheerful nurses catering to the needs they think she has, being fed a cacophony of drugs that would kill a rampaging moose-lion. Her dream lingers on the edge of memory, Zuko wrapping an arm around her shoulders and telling her that she is his baby sister, and thus cannot be a bad person.

Tears prick at the edge of her eyes. She snatches the drink from the nurse and downs it in one gulp, barely tasting it. The nurse nods sagely. "You'll need to be up quite early tomorrow, dearie," she says happily, "because you're going to be having visitors! Isn't that nice?"

She swallows thickly. "Who in the name of _Agni_ is coming to visit _me?_" The nurse gives her a knowing smile but doesn't respond, simply taking the cup back, setting it primly on the tray, and then exiting. Hope -- unwanted, unbidden, and unbearable -- swells in her chest. Zuko? Or maybe Mai and Ty Lee, free from prison? The Avatar, perhaps?

The drug takes hold slowly, and she allows it to lull her to sleep.

Her visitor turns out to be Uncle Iroh, and she bites her lip until she tastes blood, trying to hide the crushing disappointment. As soon as he walks in, she wishes he was gone.

"I am not who you wanted to see," he remarks calmly, sitting in the chair usually reserved for the therapist. When she doesn't respond, he sighs. "I came to see how you were doing, Azula. Do they treat you well?"

"Yes," she replies coldly, and does not elaborate. He nods.

"Your brother has proven himself to be quite the Fire Lord," he says conversationally, watching her carefully. The old Azula would have been able to hide her emotions and brush off his comments, but between the drugs and the nightmares and the loneliness, she cannot quite banish the sour expression that flits across her features. Uncle Iroh seems to understand. "He is extremely busy. He keeps trying to make time to see you, but there aren't enough hours in the day."

"Like I want to see him, anyhow," she says, meaning for it to come out strong and uncaring, but instead it comes out like a whimper. Uncle reaches out to envelop her in a hug, but she flinches away. Briefly, an intense pain flashes over Uncle's face, but he masks it quickly.

"I'll tell him you said hello," he says in a hoarse, tight voice, and leaves.

She is alone, again.

Self-loathing sweeps over her, and without the visions of a demon to pin the feelings on, she is forced to accept that it's coming from within. Uncle might have saved her, once, if he'd stayed at the palace. Just the same way Mother might have saved her, if she'd bothered to unlock her door. And Zuko might have saved her, if she'd ever asked him to.

And they call this mercy.


	5. storm

_storm_

She wakes up alone, and a little cold. Dawn is brushing against the horizon, and she watches thick, dark storm clouds blowing in from the east. Something, it occurs to her, is different. Not about the storm or about the room, still stubbornly _green _(they keep refusing to paint it red for her, or at least gold, or anything but this awful mint color), not even about the day.

In the dim light, she casts around her room for an answer, but finds only silence (there are no demons hissing secrets in her ear), a broken chair (when the therapist visited last, she raged and fumed and screamed cursewords that would have made her father flinch, and the chair remains a nasty monument to her temper), and a blank, empty desk (_for letter-writing_, they told her, and she has never touched it).

And all of a sudden, she knows what's so different.

Today, she isn't the prisoner or the mental patient or the victim of a thousand monsters - today, she is Azula.

She is lucid.

She is sane. And she isn't angry, or plotting, and she doesn't crave death or murder or torture or _power_. In fact, all she really wants is a cup of tea and a little conversation. Anyone will do, so she sidles up to the door and knocks on it, feeling brighter than she has in as long as she can remember.

"Yes, dear?" A nurse-slash-guard asks, opening the door warily (the memory of her rage is obviously quite fresh). She decides to be friendly, partly because she doesn't want to be left alone and partly because she knows it'll set the nurse on edge, and messing with people's minds has always been her favorite past-time.

"I was wondering if I might have some tea, please? Ooh, and maybe a breakfast danish of some kind? Please?" She opens her eyes wide and smiles. The nurse leans away from her, apparently worried that she will suddenly grow fangs and lunge for her throat. Idly, she wishes she did have the power to grow fangs. It would make for quite a good time.

"Of, of course, my dear, of course."

The therapist returns with her tea and a fruit danish, which she sets delicately on the desk before sitting on the bed as politely as possible. Azula picks up the teacup and swirls its contents lazily.

"You seem... calmer than usual today, Azula," the woman says conversationally. Azula looks her over with a critical eye. She is young, no more than twenty-five, with thick black hair and warm brown eyes - everything about her screams _trustworthy _and _compassionate_. It's really no wonder they chose this specific person to be her own personal therapist. She's the kind of person it's impossible to dislike; she exudes such warmth and kindness that even Azula can't bring herself to hate her.

"What's your name?" she asks abruptly, catching the other woman off-guard. She raises her eyebrows.

"I'm here to talk about you, Azula..." she begins uncertainly, but Azula waves her off.

"I didn't ask what you were here for. I asked your name."

The therapist pauses, before saying, slowly, as though expecting Azula to burst into hysterics at any moment, "Lily. My name is Lily."

"Lily? And where are you from, Lily?"

Lily raises an eyebrow, but answers again in the same cautious tone, "A small city by the sea called Ohana. You probably haven't heard of it," she continues, as Azula opens her mouth to respond. Azula nods slowly, and motions with a hand for Lily to continue. "It's a fishing village, more than anything. Once I was old enough to realize how... small it was, I made my way to the capital to seek my fortunes."

"And how has that worked out for you, the fortune-seeking business?"

"Well enough," she replies simply, "I'm here, aren't I?"

"Some might argue that you were better off in your fishing village," Azula says daintily, raising her cup to her lips but not drinking from it.

"I am not among them."

Azula watches Lily warily. "No? You think that playing nursemaid to the diseased ex-Fire Princess is better than sailing around for fish?"

"I think," Lily corrects softly, "that helping the wounded Fire Princess regain her footing and live a better life than she might have without my aid is better than sailing around for fish."

A small part of her wants to scream. This kind of blind compassion frustrates her - why should this woman, who, by all rights, doesn't have half a reason to give a damn about her - why does this woman _care?_ Why does she bring tea and pastries for a disgraced madwoman at spirits-forsaken hours of the morning? _Why?_ Azula has nothing left to offer her in exchange for this kindness, no kingdom or jewels or even safety - and yet, without anything to gain, Lily the Therapist is sitting here with the most dangerous woman in the world, like it's perfectly natural. Like it's all she could ever want to do.

"Do you," she begins, and hates her voice for cracking, "do you think I'll ever go back into polite society?" She tries to inject the last two words with a measure of venom and sarcasm, but the effort fails and her earnest is laid bare.

Lily's face is guarded - she's worried that her answer might upset Azula's delicate sanity. So she answers with care, "I don't believe that you really want to."

"You're right," she says harshly, "I don't."

There's a pause. Lily nods slowly, face carefully blank.

"I _don't_," she repeats, but it rings false even to her own ears. Inside of her, a darkness opens up, a bottomless pit of rage and despair, but she is so _tired _of rage and despair. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, inhaling the soothing scent of the tea - the familiar, bitter undercurrent of the mood stabilizer, the fragrant jasmine and oolong tea added to hide the medicine's taste, the subtle honey, added because Lily knows that Azula likes her tea sweet. Focus on the now, on the reality. Keep the demons at bay. "Besides," she says, her voice hoarse with tears she will never shed, "if I ever get out of this place, I'll be thrown in prison for good."

"I doubt that very much," Lily tells her calmly. "Your brother wouldn't do that to you."

She laughs at this, harsh and unforgiving, and teeters just a little closer to that gaping maw in her mind. "Zuko? He doesn't care what happens to me, so long as I'm not trying to steal his throne."

"That isn't true. He sends me letters every week, inquiring as to how you are doing."

"No doubt penned by Uncle."

"No, they aren't."

"How do you know?"

"Because your uncle sends me letters every week as well, and the penmanship is quite different," Lily says matter-of-factly, folding her hands into her robe. Azula is suddenly, painfully, reminded of Mai.

She wants - down to her very _bones_ - to break down into sobs, to fall to the floor and _cry_ with Lily the Therapist until everything just rights itself and all of this horror and madness and _tea_ and despair and anger and fear and hate all just dry up and blow away in the wind. Until she just wakes up suddenly and she's in the palace and Mother is real again, waking her up to come and have breakfast with her and Zuko and Father, or maybe on Ember Island, watching those stupid actors in their stupid play. She wants to make it all just disappear.

Instead, she bites her tongue and drinks the cup of tea in one searing gulp.

"Azula?" Lily asks tenderly, but Azula is no longer quite here. She's half on Ember Island and half lost in the pit and the last thing she wants is to be brought out of it and placed back in this little room.

"You're _lying_," she spits angrily, and Lily recoils, adjusting to the abrupt mood swing with practiced ease, while trying to figure out what induced it in the first place. "They don't _care _about me! Go _away!"_ she shrieks, and throws the teacup. It shatters against the wall behind Lily, who hastily gets up and complies, shutting and locking the door behind her. A violent Azula is, they've all learned, best left alone.

But Azula doesn't want to be alone, and she can't quite figure out why. She wants - she wants everything and nothing and for things to be as they used to be and also for things to be as they never were. She wants to crawl into her father's lap and hug him tight around the middle, even though she can't ever remember doing such a thing. She wants a mother to soothe her, a brother to tease her, a friend to hug her. She wants to stop wanting and she wants to want different things and - and - and -

She wants to be sane, and she wants to be mad, and right now she's at some horrible place in-between and it's _killing _her.

She sinks onto the bed and refuses to acknowledge the hot tears on her face.

* * *

A/N: In case it wasn't clear, it was the sudden recollection of Mai that set Azula off. Also, the town that Lily comes from? Oh, I fail at names. It means family, and family means...


	6. the path to repentance

**the path to repentance**

-_ the world goes whispering to its own  
-"this anguish pierces to the bone;"  
- and tender friends go sighing round__  
-"what love can ever cure this wound?"  
- my days go on, my days go on._  
(Elizabeth Barret Browning, De Profundis)

They don't warn her that he's coming. She is both infuriated by this and eternally grateful.

"Azula?"

When he walks in, she's standing at the window, watching the far-off sea crash against the rocks, and she doesn't immediately recognize that he is real. After so long - how many months has it been now? - she's begun filing all familiar voices under "hallucinations; to be ignored." She stands very, very still and waits for the inevitable castigation to begin, for him to start attacking her the way he always does in her mind. It doesn't come.

He sighs, and the door shuts behind him, but he doesn't speak. He doesn't seem to know what to say. She doesn't move, doesn't breathe, doesn't think.

What does he want? Why is he here? How can she be sure he's even real?

"Zuko," she says emotionlessly. What can she say to him? _I'm sorry I tried to kill you and your friend_? It isn't strictly true and he wouldn't believe her anyway, so there's no point in empty apologies. "What are you here for?" she asks, and a million possible answers cross her mind - he's here to gloat, he's here to ask for advice, he's here to apologize, he's here to see how far she's fallen, he's here to take her away to be executed, he's here to free her...

"I... I wanted to see how you were doing," he replies softly. "I've written letters, but they... Well, they all tell me the same thing and you never..." He trails off, no doubt eying the untouched writing desk, and takes a deep breath, continuing haltingly, "The doctor, um, therapist... uh, person, she tells me that you're doing better."

It's unmistakable, the touch of hope in his voice, and she realizes that he doesn't know what Azula doing better really means. Does it mean that she's getting back to her old ways, or that she's no longer a menace to society?

"I suppose I am," she replies simply, not entirely willing to tell him everything, to let him see what lies beneath his sister's mask. Besides, he isn't here because he _cares_, he's here because he knows he can't ignore her forever. They were never the kind of family who kept up with each other and worried about the others' well-being.

"That's... good," he says, unsure. There's a sound of creaking bed springs as he sits down on her bed, suddenly shifting into her peripheral vision. His right side is facing her, and he looks exhausted and a little sad. She's struck, suddenly, with a nasty sense of vindication, like if _she _had become Fire Lord, she certainly wouldn't be having the trouble he's clearly having with it. She would be running the country so much better than he must be, winning the war and putting the Avatar to death and stopping anyone who dared to stand in her way.

But it passes, and leaves her feeling drained and empty and lonely, standing in a room with the brother she's never really known. The silence stretches on, long and awkward, sucking what energy she has out of her. She casts him a sidelong glance. He's looking around the room as though trying to find something they can talk about, something to fill this awful silence.

"Why are you really here, Zuko?" she asks abruptly, and he turns to her, annoyance crossing his face.

"I told you, I wanted to see - "

"Oh, stop lying," she cuts him off savagely. "You don't care what they do to me or how I'm doing, so long as I'm not about to kill everyone here and start up a civil war. Are you _such _a coward that you can't even _admit _it?"

He looks surprised, and just a little bit hurt, but she's beyond caring. He's been holed up in the palace for months - over a year - now, not even bothering to come see her when she's at her worst, but now that they say she's doing better, _now _he wants to play the caring, concerned brother? The lie stings her down to her very core, because he'll _profit _from this, the public will call him _noble _and _good _but she knows better - she knows what he's really after. She can feel it rising in the back of her mind, a sick, deep fury with him for being so - so - for standing there like this is _natural_, like he's supposed to be here and do this for her - like he _cares_, like he _wants _her to get better.

"Azula, is it so hard for you to believe that I actually care about what happens to you?"

She turns on him then, and wishes desperately that she could set him on fire (but no, they've been feeding her herbs to keep that suppressed since she came here). Instead, she does the only thing she can, and lunges at him, in a flailing, uncoordinated mess of an attack, her fingernails - kept clipped short - clawing at his throat, her legs kicking out at his knees, a scream ripping itself from her throat, unshed tears in her eyes. She shoves him down on the bed, hitting any part of him she can reach, and he lets out a yell and grabs for her wrists, using his superior size to overpower her and throw her off of him.

The nurses who stand guard at her door rush in as he's standing, a look of horror and rage on his face, but Azula can do nothing but lay on the bed where he shoved her and gasp for breath.

"I'm so sorry, Fire Lord," one of the nurses starts, but he isn't listening. He looks directly into her eyes, and he sees something terrible there, his expression changing from anger to one of utmost pity. She wants to attack him again, but the nurses are holding her down and calling for medication, for that syrup because _the princess is in another one of her moods_ - and she _hates_, although she can't say what, exactly, her hate is directed toward.

She knows what he sees in her eyes - she sees it every time she looks into a mirror. It's the reason Lily the Therapist avoids eye contact when she's unstable like this, it's the reason none of them ever look her in the face. Looking into Azula's eyes is like looking into the abyss, and seeing all the evil and cruelty and _darkness_ the world has ever bred looking back.

"Azula..." Zuko starts, but she spits at his feet and turns her head away so he can't see how much _pain _she's feeling. "_Agni_, Azula, I'm so sorry for all of this."

"I don't want your _fucking _pity!" she screams, and tries to wrench her arms free from the nurses, as another aide rushes in with a small cup of the thick syrup she half wants and half doesn't. Zuko's image before her begins to blur with tears she can't control, and she falls back against the bed, defeated and broken and feeling like she's regressed irrevocably in the ten minutes her brother has been here. By the time she's swallowed the syrup, he's been escorted out.

The nurse holds her like a mother while she shakes and chokes back sobs, until she finally falls asleep.

After that, Zuko makes it a point to visit her every week.

* * *

A/N: I don't want it to seem like Azula's become weepy, but she's also very, very fragile and she has no strength left to fight with. Plus, these are simply snapshots, many focusing on the particularly bad days, but if you think it's too much, let me know.


	7. breathe

_breathe._

"Good morning, Azula," Lily said quietly. Azula, standing at the window and watching the rain fall, nodded. "How are you this morning?"

"Better than... earlier this week," she replied, with a hint of embarrassment. Lily sighed softly in relief and sat against the desk.

"This week hasn't been a good one," she agreed, "but I'm confident."

"Are you?" Azula asked, and then laughed hoarsely. "I'm glad one of us is."

"You're doing better," Lily insisted. Azula shrugged.

"I'm not seeing demons and attacking my own reflection anymore, no, but I'm not sure this qualifies as good." There was a very long pause, and Azula finally sighed and turned slightly. "I'm sorry," she said quickly, as though trying to get the words out before she stopped herself, "for the other day. The teacup..."

"Can be replaced," the other woman finished evenly. Azula rolled her eyes.

"I suppose I should also apologize to my brother, although I doubt I'll see him again," she mused.

"I think he'll come," Lily said, wary of Azula's notoriously unstable temper. Luckily, Azula was as sane as she'd been in over a year, and simply smirked bitterly.

"I doubt it. I attacked him, you know."

"He's your brother," she continued, gaining confidence. "You may not think it, but he does love you."

She was quiet for a moment, and then asked in a very soft voice, "Does he?"

"I believe so."

"Hmm."

There was another long, pregnant pause. Finally, Lily broke it. "Is there something you want to say, Azula?"

Azula turned, and she appeared much smaller than she really was, like a little girl tugging at her father's sleeve. There was an aura of apprehension about her, and she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out for a long moment, and then finally - "Will I ever be - well?" she asked, in a voice barely above a whisper. "Or will I always be... like this?"

"I..." Lily began, and found herself unable to meet Azula's eyes, "I don't know, Azula," she finally said, resigned. "Maybe. The mind is... complicated, and the future moreso. There's no way to know what you'll feel or think tomorrow, or a week from now, or a year from now. All we can do is just... keep going."

It wasn't the answer Azula was looking for, but it wasn't the answer she'd expected either. The once-proud princess looked back to the window, closing her eyes as lightning flashed and thunder shook the air. "I used to be able to make that," she whispered.

"I know."

"I don't... I never will again, will I?"

Lily hesitated, but found that the truth was her only answer. "No," she said simply. Azula nodded, and her shoulders slackened suddenly as though a great weight had descended upon her.

"That's all," she sighed, her voice a shadow of its earlier strength. "You can go now."

"Azula - "

"Please," she said, and looked up, eyes dry and face pale. "Let me be." Her voice was low but even, calm but desperately broken, heart-wrenching in its quiet resignation. Lily nodded slowly.

"Of course, Azula," she whispered, and stood up to leave. "You don't have to do this alone, you know?"

At the window, watching the rain, Azula replied, "I'm used to being alone. I'll be fine." She turned to Lily at the door and smiled as brightly as she was able. "Don't worry about me, Lily darling, I'll be just fine."

"Who are you trying to convince?" Lily asked, unable to let it go. Something sparked in Azula's eyes, and she turned back to the window abruptly.

"That's all," she said loudly, in a very authoritative, Princess of the Fire Nation tone. 'You may go."

Lily sighed and left.

Azula continued to watch the lightning.

* * *

A/N: I'm not too happy with this one, but I wanted to show Azula on a relatively good day, and also to shift her from a more manic state to a depressed one, and also to bring up the issue with her bending and how she's coming to terms with things.


	8. serenity

_serenity_  
(it's just an object. it doesn't mean what you think.)

Azula is having a crisis.

The demons aren't actually there, but she is picturing them anyway, laughing darkly at some personal joke, their fingers wrapped around her neck and she wants them _gone_. It isn't a hallucination - the drugs have made them go - it's something much more personal than that, something that runs deeper and hurts far, far worse. It's herself, twisted into the person she's become, an overdose of perspective turning her against her own mind, against the torture that is her life now.

"Azula, please - "

Whispers, they whisper _where did she get the knife? _and _who was stupid enough to give her that? _and _put it down, Azula, please_, but they all blur into one. She's heard this tone before, a thousand times before. It's the tone Mother always used with her, that pleading tone, begging her to reconsider, to change, to stop being s_uch a monster_. She backs away from the therapist and the nurses, holding the knife aloft tightly and with less control than she's used to, threatening - what, she doesn't, but she's damn sure they'll get it if they come closer.

"Azula," Lily the Therapist pleads, "just put the knife down. You don't want - whatever your planning, this isn't what you want."

"How do you know what I want?" she cries back, voice raw as though from screaming. Her thigh is bleeding heavily, and she hopes vaguely that she severed something vital. "What if this is what I want?" she screeches, and Lily pales, holding out her hands placatingly.

"Please, Azula - "

With a hoarse cry like a wounded animal, she rushes forward and slashes wildly, catching Lily on the open palm. The therapist cries out and stumbles back, and three nurses immediately run to block Azula from doing any more damage, but she's holding the knife too tightly and attacking too sharply for them to take it from her, so they all back off warily and watch for her next move. Tears of frustration fall from her eyes, stinging on raw scratch-marks she's made on her own face.

It's a bad day. And everyone's tensions are running high because the Fire Lord visited today; she half-hopes that he'll return and walk in on this scene, because maybe then he'll stop coming around and telling her how much he cares and how he's going to find Mother and she'll say the same thing and maybe he will learn to _never fucking bring Mai here ever again_ because this is one of Mai's knives she slipped out of the dark girl's sleeve and maybe he'll just - just stop, maybe they will all just _stop_ this stupid game they're playing with her head.

"Azula," Lily pleads again, "Azula, I know you don't want this. You want - you want freedom, don't you?"

"I'll get my freedom," she hisses in response, lunging at the nearest nurse, who yelps and backs away. Azula smirks cruelly; that's more like it. "One way or another, I'm getting out of this fucking place _now_."

"But you're doing so well..."

"_Well?" _she howls, "Does this look like _well_ to you?"

"Not now, but you've been doing much better. You can control this thing - "

"I am controlling _this thing_," she shrieks, "this is how I'm controlling it!"

"No, Azula," Lily cries, "this is you letting it control you! The Azula I know - the Azula you were - she would never consider suicide!"

It's as though she's been punched in the gut. Instead of the intended response, however, she reacts with fury: how _dare_ this woman talk about the Azula she _was_, how dare she claim to know anything about her.

"Go _away!_" she screams, attacking blindly again, but missing.

"Not until you give us the knife, Azula," Lily says, as calmly as possible, wrapping a bandage around her wounded hand. Behind her, a nurse comes in with a cup filled with that thick syrup, but Azula wants nothing less than she wants that syrup. It'll only sedate her, and they'll take away the knife, and they'll take away her _chance._

"Get that - that _stuff _away from me!" She indicates at the nurse with the knife and Lily nods hastily.

"Okay, Azula. We won't sedate you. Just... please give me the knife."

_Throw it at her_, she is struck suddenly with the thought, speaking in that familiar voice she hates so much - _throw it right into her stomach like Mai would._

But she doesn't want to do that to Lily. Lily promised her she would never be alone, and she's worked hard to keep that promise. Lily doesn't deserve to die.

_That wouldn't have stopped you before._

"No," she croaks, half at Lily and half at herself, "no, just - just go away. Just let me go."

"No, Azula," Lily says, trying to step in front of the nurses, eyes pleading. "I promised you that you wouldn't be alone, didn't I?"

Azula shakes violently, and the knife almost falls from her slackening grip, but she clutches at it again in frustration. "Give me one reason," she whispers, turning the shaking knife to her own chest, "one reason not to."

For a long moment, nothing moves. Dust swirls the air, her new chair overturned and smashed, the drawers of her desk ripped out and smashed against the wall, the blanket torn and discarded, window broken - except for the sound of the wind outside, the room is silent. Finally, Lily takes a deep breath.

"Because you're stronger than that."

Azula blinks.

She drops the knife.

* * *

A/N: Quick removal-and-edit because &^%$! I had a stupid with the tenses. I started this in present tense and then thought "wait no I've done all the others in past tense fix that" and then I posted it and looked back and went ARGH YOU IDIOT, so I had to re-fix the tenses. Quote at the beginning is still from River Tam of Firefly and you should still watch it.


End file.
